


All the Wounds That Are Ever Gonna Scar Me

by quartermile



Series: homecoming [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe – Modern Setting, Angst, Bucky Barnes Feels, Happy Ending, I Can't Believe I Wrote This, M/M, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Sad, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Whump, Stucky - Freeform, ballet instructer!nat, but he still have several of his health problems, cause there wasn’t a serum, death of a soldier, don’t read if that’s not something you can stomach, fluid pov, forever not beta’d, grab the Kleenex, just a growth spurt, non-graphic references to a body maybe going kablooey, samtasha - Freeform, so maybe trigger warning?, softer version of nat, soldier!bucky, talk of death and explosions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-04
Updated: 2015-08-04
Packaged: 2018-04-12 21:57:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4496214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quartermile/pseuds/quartermile
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every Army spouse has nightmares of this sort of thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All the Wounds That Are Ever Gonna Scar Me

“I just really don’t think mint goes with chocolate,” Natasha is saying as Steve walks into the kitchen to find her and Sam arguing over what kind of cookies they should make to take to his mother’s house for Sunday dinner.

“How could it not? Mint chocolate chip is a classic cookie choice!” Sam exclaims.

“I don’t know about classic but I know some people like them. Some people are also cannibals but that doesn’t mean everyone should be,” She replies calmly, a stark contrast to the normally calm Sam who is exceptionally upset over cookie baking.

“Geez, Nat, that’s kind of morbid,” Steve replies though it’s really not unusual coming from her.

“But it proved my point though, didn’t it?” She says.

“No it didn’t!” Sam says.

“Sam,” You don’t even like mint chocolate chip,” Steve reminds him.

“I know, but when I suggested it, she said they were gross. I wouldn’t make gross cookies,” Sam insists, voice lowering in volume. Good thing, they wouldn’t want the neighbors calling a domestic disturbance.

“So the real issue here is that you are upset that anyone would insinuate that you would bake bad cookies, when the only reason they would think that is because they just don’t like the type of cookie?” Steve asks as Natasha nods in agreement. The doorbell rings and pushes himself off of the doorframe he was leaning on, grinning at Sam’s indignant noise as he goes to open it.

As soon as the door opens, Steve makes a choked off sounding gasp, “No… No, no, no…” he whispers, voice growing louder with every word. Natasha and Sam spring up from their chairs in time to see most frightened look pass across his features. Blue eyes fall dull and already pale skin turns white as a sheet.

Two uniformed servicemen. That can only mean one thing. 

“Steve Rogers?” The taller one asks. There’s a cross pinned to the sleeve of the other man. A chaplain.

Tears swim in Steve’s eyes and all he can do is nod. His throat feels closed up and his lips sewn shut, words wouldn’t get passed his vocal chords even if he tried so he can’t answer the man. Part of his brain hopes that if he doesn’t speak, the men won’t tell him what they’re unquestionably there to tell him.

“May we come inside?” he asks. Somewhere in the very back of Steve’s mind, he registers that the insignias on his shoulders and cuffs mean he is a Captain. 

Steve steps back, jolting when his back hits the wall behind the door but he doesn’t let go of it. Honestly, he’s pretty sure his iron grip on the edge where he pulled it open is the only thing keeping his knees from buckling.

“The Secretary of the Army regrets to inform you that your husband-”

“No,” he whispers again, begging as hot tracks of tears running down his cheeks. He flinches when a hand rests on his shoulder. He doesn’t know if it’s Sam or Natasha. Frankly, he doesn’t care. He wants to rewind time about two minutes and make sure this never happens and the words don’t come out of the Captains mouth. But he just keeps going.

“That your husband Sergeant James Barnes was killed in action yesterday in Baghdad, Iraq,” he says, “There was an attack on their convoy on a transport back to base. There were no survivors. There is an ongoing investigation but once the investigation is complete, you will have full access to the report.”

He hardly hears the details. His mind blanked out after the words “killed in action.” He feels his world collapse around him. Crashing and burning down at his feet, hot licks of flame charring his skin as it searches for his heart. That’s what it’s there for right? Because that’s what it feels like.

“Did- did he hurt?” he chokes out because if Bucky is gone and this really isn’t a terrible nightmare, he needs to know it was painless. A world without Bucky Barnes is lifeless and dull – a world Steve doesn’t want to be a part of, but one that he had to hurt in as well? That’s cruel in the most basic form of the word. He can’t breathe. He’s long since outgrown his childhood asthma but it feels just like an attack. It feels like a weight is resting on his chest, trying to squeeze out every ounce of air from his body. 

“I honestly don’t know the answer to that, Mr. Rogers. You have all of the details that I have myself,” the Captain says, “I’m sorry.” He says, head bowing as he steps back to allow the Chaplain to come forward.

Something presses into his hand and Steve looks down to see his backup inhaler he keeps just in case, Natasha wrapping his fingers around it. He doesn’t use it like he should but feels it leave his fingers as he drops it onto the table near the door that’s edge had been digging into his hip. His brain doesn’t even connect the command to his muscles. His lungs are screaming at him. His chest is on fire now and the wheezing sounds may be coming from him but he can’t be sure.

“When are they bringing his- um. Him back?” Sam asks from somewhere to his right. His voice is trembling.

“Sergeant Barnes’ body has not been found as of yet. Teams on the ground in Baghdad are still searching for his remains along with a few others,” the Captain replies.

“Oh God,” Steve manages, gasping for a breath. He wonders if he purposely used _remains_ rather than _body_. Does that mean he may not be able to see his face one last time?

The chaplain rests a hand on his shoulder, “Is there anything you need?”

“Bucky,” the word comes out a sob and his knees give out under him. He doesn’t hit the floor as hard as he expects to, though, Sam having lurched forward and curled his arms around his chest.

He pulls his knees up to his chest, sobbing into them. He faintly hears the men speaking to Natasha while Sam provides a solid presence beside him. His arm weighs heavy around his shoulders but all he can really feel is the weight of the entire world raining down on him in fiery chunks, blacking out every source of light that may have shown. Bucky’s bright smile, those ocean blue eyes he always woke up to in the morning. He’ll never see that again?

All Steve can see is the vision of a wooden box with a flag draped over it being carried over the grass in front of him. He hears not the sounds of his own heart-wrenching sobs leaving his lips, or Sam telling him to use his inhaler, or the Chaplain asking Natasha if there is anyone else that should be called to come by while Natasha assures him they are family. What he hears are the trumpets, the commands shouted and the guns shooting over the coffin. 

They may as well be aimed right at his chest.

When he comes back to himself and his eyes focus, it’s dark outside the window in front of him. He doesn’t know what time it is or how much time has even passed, all he knows is the world outside is just as dark as it is inside his head.

He’s not sure how he got onto the couch or how long he’d been staring at the floor. His cheeks feel raw and his eyes feel like they’re full of sand. His mouth is dry while his throat is sore from his sobbing.

He feels an ache in his fingers and he looks down to find them clutching a pillow to his chest so hard his knuckles are white. He’s rocking just slightly back in forth or else the earth is, he’s not sure. He lets go of the pillow to find his hands shaking as he drops it to the couch beside him.

“There you are,” Natasha says in a soft voice as she kneels down in front of him, hands resting on his knees.

“What time is it?” Is all he can think to ask. His voice is hoarse.

She cracks a small smile but he can see the red rimming her eyes, “A little after seven. It’s been awhile since you’ve said anything.”

“Why did this happen?” he whispers. 

“I really wish I had an answer for you, Steve,” she replies, standing and sitting beside him, pulling him into her side, “but I don’t.”

Sam steps back into the room when he hears their quiet exchange, “The Casualty Assistance Officer is here whenever you’re ready, man,” he says softly.

Steve flinches at the word casualty but shakes his head in utter defeat, “How could I ever be ready?” 

-=-

Three days later, Steve isn’t sure he’s stopped crying yet. 

The CA Officer had given him a rough plan of the memorial service in planning for Bucky as per usual army regulations. But Steve can’t look at it. He got as far as _Memorial for_ before throwing it away from him as if it’d electrocuted him. 

Natasha and Sam have hardly left his side. He’s not sure if they’re expecting him to do something to himself but he’s honestly too exhausted to even entertain the thought. Besides he has to see to it that is husband has a service fit for a hero. He has to call it a service, he can’t even think of the f word.

He’s been sleeping on the couch in the living room. It’s hard enough sleeping in their shared bed when Bucky is deployed, but knowing he’ll never sleep in it again? No, he very well can’t risk the scent of Bucky’s cologne being covered up by his own, now can he?

He’s not sure if it’s actually hit him yet. 

He’s not sure if he wants it to, though. Because that means he has to work slowly through it and eventually accept it. He doesn’t think he can do that. He can never accept a world with no James Buchanan Barnes.

He wants to be mad at Bucky for even enlisting, but that had been something they’d done together before they’d really started dating. They didn’t count on Steve’s medical problems keeping him from being accepted.

But Bucky loved being a soldier and he wouldn’t want to take that away from him because he was angry at the way the world decided to rip them apart so cruelly. 

And boy, was he angry.

He’s currently laying on Sam and Natasha’s bed, his head in Natasha’s lap as she cards her fingers through his hair. He can hear her nearly inaudible sniffles and he’d felt a teardrop land on his shoulder but he decides not to mention it.

She and Sam had been cleaning out the freezer to make room for all the damn casseroles the neighbors keep sending when Steve’d tried to read the memorial plan that ended with him driving his fist through the wall in the hallway. 

He knows this is hard on all of them, Bucky being one of their best friends and housemate as well as Steve’s husband. 

“You’ve got to read it eventually, Steve,” Natasha tells him quietly, “Or let Bucky’s parents plan it.”

“It’s not his parent’s job, it’s mine,” he says back, “I’m not going to look at it until he’s back here.” He insists in a tone that suggests he won’t be budging on this. Her fingers tighten infinitesimally for just a moment but she doesn’t argue further.

-=-

Five days and seventeen hours after the servicemen show up on his doorstep, the phone rings. He debates not answering but figures if it’s Mama Barnes, she’d be quick to show up if he didn’t.

Turns out, it’s The Call. The one he’d been dreading. He definitely wants Bucky back stateside but this call means he has to accept it, or at least work towards that. He doesn’t know if he’s ready for it.

The only thing that softens the blow is that it’s a friend of theirs.

“Hello?” he answers, wincing to himself at how wrecked his voice is.

“Steve? It’s Phil Coulson,” the voice on the other end says.

“Phil? Oh God,” Steve inhales sharply when realization dawns on him why Phil would be calling. When he’s stateside, they’d always find some time to hang, but being stationed at the same base as the fallen soldiers, there would be radio silence until every family member was informed. Unless Phil is the informer in this case, “Is this what I think it is?”

“Yes, Steve. We found Bucky,” Phil says, “We’re bringing him home. I don’t have the exact details of the flight right now but it’ll be tomorrow morning.”

Steve finds himself momentarily speechless. His heart plummets to his stomach. This means it’s real. H makes a wounded noise in the back of his throat that prompts Phil to ask if he’s okay, “I haven’t been okay in almost a week, Phil.” He whispers, hot tears flowing anew down his cheeks, “You– You found him?”

“We found him Steve,” Phil repeats, “We’re bringing him home to you.”

Sam walks into the room then having heard Steve speaking. He takes one look at Steve’s face and he heaves out a sad sigh, “They found him?”

Steve nods, hanging up after distantly hearing Phil tell him he’ll call back when he has the itinerary. Sam sits down beside him and rubs a hand over his back in a comforting gesture that does nothing of what it should do.

He just really feels numb. Well, aside from the bone-crushing sadness.

-=-

The sky is overcast the next morning when they meet the plane at the base. Once they’re checked by security, Steve, Natasha, and Sam are lead to where the plane is just opening it’s ramp. It’s a small plane but damn if it doesn’t feel huge because of the weight of it all.

There are a line of soldiers along both sides of the ramp as six more enter the plane to carry off the coffins. It’s only a few moments before the first is seen. Steve’s breath catches in his throat. He doesn’t know if anyone else is even being brought back. The soldiers all snap to a salute and he sees in the corner of his eye – however blurred from swimming tears it may be – Sam physically restrain himself from doing the same. He’d exited the Air Force after an accident on him and his friend Riley after his first year. He’s here as a civilian, a family member.

Steve feels Natasha take his hand and he vaguely becomes aware of how sweaty his palm is. It’s the nerves. The terror that this may all be actually true.

“Is that..?” he asks after a moment to Natasha though she has no way of knowing either. He doesn’t have to wait for an answer though, because right after the men pass him, they stop with the box, marching in place for a moment before someone else hands another family waiting a folded up flag. 

It’s not Bucky. 

Yet, his brain reminds him.

The coffin is loaded into an awaiting hearst. All eyes turn back to the plane. But the soldiers don’t board again. He feels an anger start to bubble up in his chest. Were they wrong? Was Bucky not being brought home on this plane?

The soldiers lined up snap back into a salute and Steve lifts his eyes to the Commander helping a soldier limp down the ramp.

Helping _Bucky_ limp down the ramp.

Steve is stunned for the barest of seconds. Sam and Natasha gasp from behind him in shock. Is this real? This can’t be a dream right? The universe isn’t that cruel?

It’s like someone turned the sun back on. His world lights back up with a big neon _Bucky_ sign. It’s like a breath of fresh air. For the first time in nearly a week, he doesn’t have a crushing weight forcing the air from his lungs but full ones, breathing in the scent of his Bucky. He no longer feels the scorches from the invisible fire that’d burned right through his skin and incinerated his insides. He just feels joy. Pure, raw, breathtaking elation.

“Oh my God!” he startles out. It’s muffled behind the hands that fly up to cover his mouth as the tears he’d been struggling to hold back finally release, “Bucky!”

Bucky jerks his head up, following his voice and when he looks at Steve, it’s like looking at an angel. His angel. He looks like he can hardly believe his eyes. The look of a man who hadn’t expected to make it back home. Even the more hardened soldiers standing around have a tough time keeping dry eyed at the reunion.

Steve ignores whatever military form there may be and runs, throwing his arms around Bucky, barely registering the soft grunt of pain Bucky gives.

“Oh my – I’m so sorry! How bad are you hurt?” Steve demands, pulling back to look Bucky over. He’d been so shocked at seeing Bucky on his feet rather than a flagged draped pine box that he forgot to check for injuries. That should’ve been one of his first thoughts before launching himself at him.

“I’m fine, baby,” Bucky replies, though Steve can see the almost imperceptible sway that means the few minutes he’s been on his feet is a little much, “I’m just so happy to see you,” he chokes out. 

“I love you so much,” Steve whispers, pressing his lips to Bucky’s but trying to be careful of the split in his lip, “They told me - They told me you were…” he can’t say it, even though proof they’d been wrong is standing in front of him.

“I couldn’t tell you this kind of thing over the phone, Steve, even though I knew you’d want to know as soon as possible,” Phil says, stepping forward, hand resting on Bucky’s forearm as if trying to make himself believe he’s standing there as well, “I just couldn’t deliver that kind of news without being face to face.” He’d been the one helping Bucky off the plane. Steve hadn’t even noticed.

“I don’t care,” he sobs into Bucky’s chest, “I don’t care, just as long as this is real, oh god.”

“It’s real baby, I’m here,” Bucky whispers against his hair. 

“Why would they tell his family he was dead if they didn’t know?” Natasha asks, the coolness in her tone covering barely concealed rage.

“For all anyone knew, he was. It was a sneak attack. No one had any idea he could’ve gotten away. His dogtags were found at the scene and frankly. The logical and only – we thought – possible option was he’d gotten killed in the blast,” Phil explains, “There was so much rubble and organic matter that any bit of it could’ve been his,” he says, only his training keeping him from cringing at his own words and the picture they present, “I didn’t make that call, though.”

“But okay. You guys think that. Why would their families be told their loved ones aren’t coming home?” she presses.

“Per our regulations, in an event such as this, the base’s highest ranking officer on duty would assess the situation and react accordingly. He decides whether the families are to be informed of injuries or death. In something of this nature, it was assumed all parties were deceased,” he explains, “He used the smoke as cover and ran for a ditch, waited that out for nightfall and took to the nearest forest which was much farther away than we would’ve looked for any sign of survivors.”

“There was no way I wasn’t coming home to you, Stevie,” Bucky whispers, his voice thick with emotion.

“I was so devastated, Buck,” Steve sobs, hiccupping while Bucky threads his fingers through his hair. He smells fresh – he’s obviously had a shower – with the undertone of whatever used to clean his wounds but Steve can smell the desert air on him. He wants to smell his skin, the scent that’s purely Bucky. He wants to taste his skin. He wants to feel him solid on top of him, connecting them together purely for the sake of proving to themselves that the other is still alive, “I need you…”

“Hey come on guys, let’s get our soldier home,” Sam says suddenly, his arm wrapping tight around Natasha’s shoulders.

That’s exactly what they do.

**Author's Note:**

> I used this [article](http://spousebuzz.com/blog/2013/07/what-to-expect-when-a-servicemember-is-killed-or-injured.html) as my reference for when Steve was notified in the first part. It’s an interesting read about the reasoning behind the way the Army handles the death of a service member. The actual speech from the captain, I pulled from a transcription of a radio broadcast of a former service member who used to notify families.
> 
> I usually rely pretty heavily on dialogue but this turned out not having very much of it. I’m hoping the emotion carried it through to the end, though. I hope you guys enjoy? Don’t hit me for the scare!


End file.
